We Should Totally Just Drug Grandma! (Not Really)

CONTENT WARNING: This story contains content of a medical nature. It is not intended as medical advice.

I submitted this story. Grandma is up to her tricks again.

One of our cats figured out that if she puts her toys on the track for Grandma’s stairlift, it acts like a slide. This same cat also found and stole a bunch of pipe cleaners my mom had planned on using in her classroom. One day, Grandma wants to come downstairs but her stairlift isn’t working. My dad figures a cat toy is probably jammed in there — not the first time that’s happened — and tries to get it unstuck. It still doesn’t work. Dad tries a few things over the weekend but he can’t fix it. He calls a guy on Monday to come out and look at it later that week. The guy finds that a pipe cleaner has slid in and the metal part touched something and shorted out something electrical. He has to order a part, though, so Grandma is stuck upstairs for at least another week.

Grandma barely leaves her bedroom. It’s actually rather pleasant downstairs, especially at mealtimes. Dad brings her food every day so she doesn’t starve and we don’t have to put up with her. But she starts to get stir-crazy and her behavior gets more extreme as time goes on.

Because Grandma is barely moving, she starts to develop muscle cramps in her legs. A normal person might try stretching or doing a few laps in the hallway upstairs. Not my grandmother. She calls her doctor and gets a prescription for Percocet. She takes one pill, decides it doesn’t work, and schedules another video appointment with the doctor.

My dad is working from home right now, but Grandma doesn’t understand, no matter how many times he explains it to her, that just because he is home, it does not mean he can jump up whenever she calls. Dad gets up super early and finishes his work by 2:00 pm every day. He tells her to schedule her appointments for after 2:00 so he can help her set up the video call. She schedules the second appointment for 11:00 am. When her appointment time arrives, she calls the house phone downstairs and tells him to help her. He says he’s in a meeting and can’t right now. She calls my uncle — Dad’s brother — and says Dad is refusing to help her with her doctor’s appointment. My uncle calls Dad and is like, “what the heck are you doing?” and comes over to help her. The doctor prescribes her Tylenol with tramadol. Once again, she takes one pill and decides it doesn’t work.

The night before her stairlift is supposed to be fixed, she calls the house phone around 9:00 pm. She wants us to take her to the ER so she can get a shot for her pain because “the last shot I got lasted me nine months.” Dad points out that her stairlift is still broken and she can’t get downstairs.

Grandma: “I’m having shooting pain down my legs. I have to go to the hospital. Call 911 and they’ll carry me downstairs.”

Dad: “I’m not calling 911 just so they can carry you downstairs. Did you try Advil?”

Grandma: “No, I can’t take Advil because the doctor wants me to take acetaminophen and you can’t mix those drugs.”

Dad: “When was the last time you took acetaminophen?”

Grandma: “Yesterday. Just call 911 so they can take me to the hospital.”

Dad: “First, how do you plan on paying for this trip? Second, how do you expect to get home?”

Grandma: “They’ll bring me back once I’m done.”

Dad: “No, they won’t. You need to move around some. That will help. But if you really want to go to the hospital, then you can call 911.”

Miraculously, her pain suddenly wasn’t that bad. And sure enough, once the stairlift was fixed and she was able to go downstairs, she started moving around more and she wasn’t in any more pain. And so ends a lovely three weeks without Grandma.

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